


some things just come with Time

by sausaged



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-02-12
Updated: 2014-02-12
Packaged: 2018-01-12 03:54:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1181568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sausaged/pseuds/sausaged
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Levi has never been a noisy child or a nosy one for that matter-- but that does not mean he is not curious.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>contains a mingle of minor pairings while Levi is trying to figure himself out.</p>
            </blockquote>





	some things just come with Time

**Author's Note:**

> levi-centric; contains a hint of levi/hanji, levi/erwin/mike and implied beginning of a happy ending for levi/eren.

*****

Love.

 

Levi has never been a noisy child or a nosy one for that matter-- but that does not mean he is not curious.

He is five when he sees his mother and father kiss for the first time he can remember and he struggles not to tear because he feels some sort of bubble that rise from his tummy to his throat and he grips onto his mother's sleeve.

She merely smiles at him and presses a kiss onto his forehead before pulling him up into her arms, cradling him as if he is precious like her china collection in the living room and tells him, "I love you."

He doesn't quite understand what it means then, but a warmth replaces that awfully fragile bubble that had been brewing inside and he hiccups a small laugh.

He isn't too sure why he is feeling like this, but he wants to know.

 

 

He is twelve when a girl with long brown hair and pretty blue eyes comes up to him, pulling him aside and scruffs her little white mary-janes on the concrete floors of the under covered play area, smudging a chalk-drawn hopscotch nervously before her hands shoot from her side and grips onto his.

"I really like you!" She says, breathless and sweaty palms and all.

Levi just blinks at the girl and offers a small tilt of his head before nodding decisively. "Okay."

He's never been good with emotions, but he sort of understands when she is running to her friends and they are all giggling and hugging her and squealing, and his own friends come up behind him, clapping him on his back and laughing.

He feels a small rush of warmth but nothing that really compares to how he walks home that afternoon and tells his mother what happened and she kisses him on the cheek and sets down his favourite afternoon snack with a glass of cold processed apple juice and tells him that he's all grown up now.

Maybe in about two weeks or so the girl (what's her name again?) tells him that he isn't right for her and she's fallen in love with someone else-- some boy named Erwin from her karate class.

Levi finds that he really doesn't care, because when he goes home that day, his favourite snack is still waiting for him and so is that glass of processed apple juice. He still gets a kiss from his mother and a "she doesn't know what she's missing out on."

Nothing's changed.

 

 

Three years have passed since the girl because he is fifteen when he first feels a stirring in his chest whenever he glances at some eccentric little girl (she is just a little taller than he is) from his biology class.

Her name is Hanji, Levi does not struggle to recall her name.

He thinks that her thick round glasses are a little endearing and her messy brown hair is sort of like her science experiments-- a fucking explosion. But he can't do anything to stop the fluttering in his chest whenever she drapes an arm around him during paired science experiments and how she is overly enthusiastic about dissecting earth worms and cow eyeballs. She is all sorts of interesting and a breath of fresh air that Levi's never taken in before and she sort of sweeps him off his feet like a metaphorical hurricane.

It's gross.

But it's not bad.

That's what goes through his mind when he presses his lips to Hanji's when they are sitting outside on the steps on a McDonald's, her fingers entwining with his and her smile just a little contagious. The warmth that fluttered in his chest a few years ago returns with a little spark and Levi remembers to breathe through his nose.

Erwin joins them on the steps later and claims that he is too old to play with the kids inside despite only being a year older than they are. Then Hanji shares a small story of when Erwin was still in karate class and how every girl in Erwin's class was deathly infatuated with him-- there was this one time a girl was bold enough to confess, but Erwin was awkward enough to smile and ignore her in favour of sparring with his instructor and the girl left in tears with a withdrawal from the class two days after.

Levi is old enough to enjoy the small smug moment that flickers inside of him.

Not many high school romances manage to last a year and a half, but he and Hanji separates on good terms and they remain awfully good friends throughout their remaining years of high school.

Levi cannot explain what exactly happened that caused the small rift, but Hanji is a lot smarter than she likes people to believe, because she is the one who nuzzles him on the cheek and kisses him with a passion and a fire that is nothing short of affection.

"Something's changed."

He agrees, but he isn't too sure what.

 

 

In his last year of high school, his parents leave for a week to celebrate their twentieth anniversary.

Erwin and Mike come over for a sleepover and to keep him company.

They know, even though he is quite private and very much an introvert, he is someone who occasionally craves for attention. Levi finds that he doesn't necessarily care knowing that they know, because he has grown comfortable around them-- comfortable enough to be walking around in loose shorts and a tee-shirt while playing video games and watching gory movies and kissing and groping.

And to be honest, Levi isn't sure how he's ended up in this arrangement anyhow-- it had been another movie night at Erwin's place, just a few years ago, when a secret vow was established and adhered to even now, where they had all ended up anxiously gripping each other's boyhoods, stroking frantically and desperately in dim glow from Erwin's sixty inch television.

They take turns, thrusting and wriggling and clutching onto each other and throwing clothes that are hastily shrugged and shimmied off, the movie long forgotten and listlessly drowned in Levi's own soft keens and the sweet noises that he is pulling from Mike and Erwin's throats.

"Well that was a great movie," He hears Erwin say after, patting down Mike's touseled hair with a fond smile tugging at his lips. Swatting between them with a growl, Levi grips onto his discarded shirt and yanks it on before rolling onto his stomach to face them, body thrumming with a lingering afterglow and an inkling of lethargy seeping into his bones.

Mike yawns and the two share a gentle kiss and Levi watches; the bubble in his throat is not an unknown feeling now.

And this emotion doesn't quite dissolve even when he is pulled into their embrace and they each place a gentle kiss on his temples.

 

 

Mike is the first to break away from their arrangement when he meets Hanji through Erwin about half a year after she and Levi graduated.

The two hook up almost immediately and Levi feels a shudder run up his spine because it is a little awkward and it leaves his chest feeling like a little empty, but he is happy for them none-the-less.

 

 

Erwin is the next one and Levi isn't surprised at all.

It happens after a night of mind-blowing sex because Erwin doesn't do things half-heartedly and Levi is glad.

It's a girl named Petra, Erwin tells him, fingers running through Levi's hair and Levi leans into the touch. Erwin says she's got beautiful hair and bright eyes and a promising future and Levi nods because Erwin really needs someone who is as driven as he is and Levi's just not there yet.

"I understand," Levi replies, except he really doesn't and Erwin leaves him with a kiss and a bubble in his throat that's the hardest to swallow so far and it sort of hurts yet he doesn't cry.

Erwin is still one of his best friends, much like how Hanji is.

But something's changed, although nothing breaks, and the little warmth that used to flutter in his dies a quiet death, leaving him a little empty on the inside and wishing he could feel whatever his friends are feeling and what he is missing out on.

 

 

So during the winter break of his third year in university, he swings over to his grandparents' home for a visit as per his parents' wishes and brings along with him a small tin of handmade shortbread cookies.

He doesn't expect the place to be so much more different than his own city, but he is pleasantly surprised by the sheer peace in the air that's settled over the small town like a fleece blanket on a particularly cold day.

The beautiful bright blue sky is low, stretching for miles and miles on end, and the ground has been sprinkled with a few layers of fresh powdered snow.

It is early in the morning, maybe too early.

Levi spends too much time contemplating a cup of coffee before realizing he's already arrived, pulling into a clean and snowless driveway--

He blinks.

_Clean and snowless?_

He parks his car and really hopes that his grandparents did not do something so rash like shoveling snow, knowing that he is coming, because they really are just skin and bones. He is unlocking the door now, keys jingling just like how the leaves are shaking in the crisp winter breeze. The words are stolen from his lips when the door jerks open and the keys yanked away from him along with the door, "Grandma, Grandpa--"

He sucks in a breath he almost forgets to let go, because the world seems to jerk into motion for the first time since he's been born (or since he can remember), like a light that's been suddenly turned on in a dark room; like a billion butterflies tearing from their cocoons in his chest; like little bubbles furiously floating from his stomach and getting stuck at his throat.

"Hi!"

"... hello," Levi offers and his expression is stiff because he doesn't know what to feel-- he's never experienced this before. What--?

"You must be Levi," the boy continues and reaches for his hand.

The boy's hands are warm, unlike Levi's; and the boy is tall, unlike Levi.

Levi allows himself to be pulled inside and notices that the boy's smile is sort of like Hanji's, contagious.

His grandparents are sitting in the den by the fireplace, smiling and excited. "Oh, darling, it's been such a long time! You're all grown up and so handsome!"

"Mrs. Rivaille! I honestly thought you were joking about that part!" Levi's eyes flicker to the boy who is flushing and shuffling his feet, now cradling a steaming mug of what seems to be hot chocolate. "Here," the mug is then shoved unceremoniously into Levi's hands.

"I don't joke about things like that," his grandmother scowls and Levi can see himself a little in her. Her eyes are gentle when she locks eyes with him, twinkling exactly like how he remembers. "This is Eren and he sometimes come to help us with some chores. His mother is a lovely lady, who lives just next door."

Levi nods and his grandfather laughs.

It is then their eyes lock again.

Green eyes flecked with gold, he observes, completely aware that the fluttering warmth that's been dormant inside of him flares to life, spreading through his limbs and racing with his heart.

The boy ( _Eren_ , his mind quickly corrects) smiles at him and it's all teeth and Levi returns it with a small quirk of his own stiff lips. "Hello, Eren. Pleasure."

Eren laughs and it shakes Levi's whole being into place because he’s not five or twelve or fifteen or seventeen anymore.

He _knows_ now (even though he is not too sure).

**Author's Note:**

> un-beta'd. all mistakes are my own and i'm okay with that.
> 
> i just wanted some fluff. so i wrote myself some fluff...  
> or my own definition of fluff, i guess. because wtf is melancholy fluff? well, i don't really know. orz
> 
> hope you enjoyed!


End file.
